Pharma companies delist patents from FDA’s Orange Book following FTC challenges

At least three phar­ma com­pa­nies have re­quest­ed to pull patents from an FDA data­base af­ter the Fed­er­al Trade Com­mis­sion chal­lenged more than 100 patents it said were im­prop­er­ly list­ed.

The phar­ma in­dus­try has been un­der in­creased scruti­ny from the FTC this year, in­clud­ing dis­putes last month about patents for brand-name asth­ma in­halers, ep­i­neph­rine au­toin­jec­tors and oth­er drugs. And FTC chair Lina Khan has said that wrong­ful­ly-list­ed patents un­der­mine “fair and hon­est com­pe­ti­tion” and can dri­ve up the cost of health­care for Amer­i­cans who use in­halers and EpiPens.

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